I was sad to learn of the death of Kevin Baker, who co-authored with Peter Deadman the seminal textbook of acupuncture in the west, ‘A Manual of Acupuncture’.

Born in 1953, Kevin qualified in medicine from Cambridge University and St George’s Hospital Medical School in 1979 and went on to specialise in accident and emergency… Continue reading →

An American study published in 2015 has found that electroacupuncture has a significant and long-lasting effect in chronic hypertensive patients. Sixty-five patients with mild to moderate high blood pressure and who were not receiving medication were assigned randomly into two groups. They were then treated once a week for eight weeks with electroacupuncture.

One group… Continue reading →

A Chinese study in 2015 found that both acupuncture and moxibustion had a positive impact in patients diagnosed with irritable bowek syndrome.Benefits were measured in both subjective symptom scores and objective measurement scales.

82 patients were randomly divided into acupuncture and moxibustion groups for treatment and received treatment for four weeks. Both the acupuncture and… Continue reading →

A BBC programme shown last year called ‘Trust Me I’m a Doctor’ involved an A&E doctor at St Thomas’ Hospital in south London, Dr Salehya Ahsan, undergoing a MRI while having an acupuncture treatment. She received acupuncture on just one point on her hand called Large Intestine 4, or He Gu. The experience nvolved specific… Continue reading →

There is ever-increasing clinical evidence of how effective acupuncture can be in the treatment of allergic rhintis. A 2015 Australian study involved 175 patients who received actual acupuncture treatment or sham acupuncture. The sham acupuncture involved superficial needling of non-acupuncture points without stimulation. All patients had been previously diagnosed with allergic rhinitis and had been… Continue reading →

This is a common, itchy skin disease with erythema & vesicles, which may lead to weeping & crusting. It is endogenous/constitutional – as opposed to dermatitis, although the terms are often interchanged in some contexts. Atopic eczema affects up to twenty per cent of the population & is linked in occurrence with asthma & hay… Continue reading →

One more important aspect of the traditional Chinese approach to mental-emotional disorders has been the association between mental illness, as well as developmental disorders, with inheritance and defective congenital connections. It was believed that they were indicators of bad spirits along the ancestral line and were therefore a source of great shame. It was something… Continue reading →

Another factor that influenced societal and medical approaches to mental-emotional disease in traditional Chinese culture was the role of the extended family unit. Just as self-denial and self-control were seen as necessary to keep peace within society, they were also seen as essential to keeping peace within the family. Thus, while the extended family on… Continue reading →

One of the priorities of Chinese culture and society following the disruptions of the warring states period (475 – 221 BC) was to achieve some degree of social harmony and to avoid further anarchy, warfare, and dispute in a vast country with many different cultural minorities. Confucianism, which even moreso than Daoism became the dominant… Continue reading →